The Accidental Billionaires: The Founding of Facebook

The high-energy tale of how two socially awkward Ivy Leaguers, trying to increase their chances with the opposite sex, ended up creating Facebook. The Accidental Billionaires is a compulsively readable story of innocence lost, and of the unusual creation of a company that has revolutionized the way hundreds of millions of people relate to one another.

Once upon a Time in Russia: The Rise of the Oligarchs and the Greatest Wealth in History

The best-selling author of Bringing Down the House (63 weeks on the New York Times best seller list and the basis for the hit movie 21) and The Accidental Billionaires (the basis for the Academy Award-winning film The Social Network) delivers an epic drama of wealth, rivalry, and betrayal among megawealthy Russian oligarchs - and its international repercussions.

Straight Flush: The True Story of Six College Friends Who Dealt Their Way to a Billion-Dollar Online Poker Empire - and How it All Came Crashing Down...

Based on extensive insider interviews and participation, acclaimed author Ben Mezrich's Straight Flush tells the captivating rags-to-riches tale of a group of University of Montana frat brothers who turned a weekly poker game in the basement of a local dive bar into AbsolutePoker.com, one of the largest online companies in the world. But then the U.S. Department of Justice placed a bull's-eye on Absolute Poker. Did they fold - or double down and ride their hot hand?

Rigged

This is the startling rags-to-riches story of an Italian-American kid from the streets of Brooklyn who claws his way into the wild, frenetic world of the oil exchange. After conquering the hallowed halls of Harvard Business School, he enters the testosterone-laced warrens of the Merc Exchange, the asylumlike oil exchange located in lower Manhattan.

Beat the Dealer: A Winning Strategy for the Game of Twenty-One

Edward O. Thorp is the father of card counting, and in Beat the Dealer he reveals the revolutionary point system that has been successfully used by professional and amateur card players for two generations. From Las Vegas to Monte Carlo, the tables have been turned, and the house no longer has the advantage at blackjack.

The 37th Parallel: The Secret Truth Behind America's UFO Highway

This real-life The X-Files and Close Encounters of the Third Kind tells the true story of a computer programmer who tracks paranormal events along a 3,000-mile stretch through the heart of America and is drawn deeper and deeper into a vast conspiracy.

War Dogs: How Three Stoners From Miami Beach Became the Most Unlikely Gunrunners in History

In January 2007 two young stoners from Miami Beach - one a ninth-grade dropout, the other a licensed masseur - won a $300 million Department of Defense contract to supply ammunition to the Afghanistan military. Incredibly, instead of fulfilling the order with high-quality arms, Efraim Diveroli and David Packouz - the dudes - bought cheap Communist-style surplus ammunition from Balkan gunrunners.

Chernobyl 01:23:40: The Incredible True Story of the World's Worst Nuclear Disaster

At 01:23:40 on April 26th 1986, Alexander Akimov pressed the emergency shutdown button at Chernobyl's fourth nuclear reactor. It was an act that forced the permanent evacuation of a city, killed thousands, and crippled the Soviet Union. The event spawned decades of conflicting, exaggerated, and inaccurate stories.

Perfect Bet: How Science and Math Are Taking the Luck out of Gambling

From the simple to the intricate and the audacious to the absurd, Adam Kucharski reveals the long and tangled history between betting and science and explains why gambling continues to generate insights into luck and decision making today. Covering exploits and ideas from across the globe, he meets the teams behind hedge funds that capitalize on inaccurate sports betting odds and explains how PhD-level pundits are using methods originally developed for the US nuclear program to predict sports results.

House of Nails: A Memoir of Life on the Edge

Eclipsing the traditional sports memoir, House of Nails, by former world champion, multimillionaire entrepreneur, and imprisoned felon Lenny Dykstra, spins a tragicomic tale of Shakespearean proportions - a relentlessly entertaining American epic that careens between the heights and the abyss. Nicknamed "Nails" for his hustle and grit, Lenny approached the game of baseball - and life - with mythic intensity.

The Lufthansa Heist: Behind the Six-million Dollar Cash Haul That Shook the World

On December 11th, 1978, a daring armed robbery rocked Kennedy Airport, resulting in the largest unrecovered cash haul in world history, totaling six million dollars. The perpetrators were never apprehended and thirteen people connected to the crime were murdered in homicides that, like the crime itself, remain unsolved to this day. The burglary has fascinated the public for years, dominating headlines around the globe due to the story's unending ravel of mysteries that baffled the authorities.

The Greatest Trade Ever: How John Paulson Defied Wall Street and Made Financial History

In 2006, hedge fund manager John Paulson realized something few others suspected--that the housing market and the value of subprime mortgages were grossly inflated and headed for a major fall. Paulson's background was in mergers and acquisitions, however, and he knew little about real estate or how to wager against housing. He had spent a career as an also-ran on Wall Street. But Paulson was convinced this was his chance to make his mark. He just wasn't sure how to do it....

Federal Agent Robert Mazur spent five years undercover as a money launderer to the international underworld, gaining access to the zenith of a criminal hierarchy safeguarded by a circle of dirty bankers and businessmen who quietly shape power across the globe. These men and women control multibillion-dollar drug-trafficking empires, running their organizations like public companies.

Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game

Moneyball reveals a quest for something as elusive as the Holy Grail, something that money apparently can't buy: the secret of success in baseball. The logical places to look would be the giant offices of major league teams and the dugouts. But the real jackpot is a cache of numbers collected over the years by a strange brotherhood of amateur baseball enthusiasts: software engineers, statisticians, Wall Street analysts, lawyers, and physics professors.

Den of Thieves

Pulitzer Prize winner James B. Stewart shows for the first time how four of the biggest names on Wall Street - Michael Milken, Ivan Boesky, Martin Siegel, and Dennis Levine - created the greatest insider-trading ring in financial history and almost walked away with billions - until a team of downtrodden detectives triumphed over some of America's most expensive lawyers to bring this powerful quartet to justice.

To Pixar and Beyond: My Unlikely Journey with Steve Jobs to Make Entertainment History

After Steve Jobs was unceremoniously dismissed from Apple, he turned his attention to a little-known graphics art company that he owned called Pixar. One day, out of the blue, Jobs called Lawrence Levy, a Harvard-trained lawyer and Silicon Valley executive to whom he had never spoken before, in the hope of persuading Levy to help him get Pixar on the right track. What Levy found in Pixar was a company on the verge of failure. To Pixar and Beyond is the extraordinary story of what happened next.

Publisher's Summary

In the midst of the Go-Go '90s, the culture of greed infused the MIT campus. A small blackjack club sprang up, dedicated to counting cards and beating the house at major casinos around the country. The Club grew slowly at first, but by the late 1990s, the right people had come up with the right system to take some of the world's most sophisticated casinos for all they were worth. In less than two years, this ring of card savants earned more than $3 million from corporate Vegas. This is the true story of how they did it.

Bringing Down the House is everyman's dream, certainly every gambler's dream, and gambling is a growth industry on the East and West Coasts.

A cross between Liar's Poker, Ocean's Eleven, and The Cuckoo's Egg, this fast-paced caper features the most unlikely of heroes, a bunch of super-smart MIT geeks. Before the dot.coms kidnapped the mathematical geniuses of MIT, here's what higher education produced from the dark underbelly of the Ivy League, where kids with brains, money, and bright futures were just as likely to be found gambling in a Paradise Island casino as putting in time in the library.

The content of this book is very good and interesting. Unfotunately, the narrator does such a horrific job that it makes it almost unlistenable. I will NEVER buy a book if this guy is reading it again!

I have never wrote a review on here before. I am usually happy with all the narrators on the books I get here. This is horrible. I can't believe this guy is drinking and burping out loud on the book. I am considering just giving up and deleting the file.

Despite the bad reviews based on the "poor narration", I went ahead and got this book. There is nothing wrong with the narrator. There were no burps, gurgles, wheezing, or gulping to really notice. Not the best narration I ever heard, but certainly not worth some of the scathing reviews.

I like true crime stories, especially ones where the charater (or perpetrator) is a genuinly likeable guy getting over on the system (think Catch Me if you Can). This book rates right up there and was an exciting read. The movie with the same title does not compare, as it is completly re-written for Hollywood and changes just about everything. The book is MUCH better and details the life of the MIT students who used their brains to beat the system.

The only reason I didn't give it 5 stars is because the author switches back and forth from his point of view to the main character's, and proves a bit confusing at times. Other than that, an excellent book.

I will say of all the books that I have purchased from Audible, this is certainly the worst when it comes to sound. While I think the narrator does a good job, the other noises (being swallowing, etc), can be a little distracting. That being said I also think it depends on how you listen. If you are listening to your book with headphones you will notice it a lot more. I however listen in my car on the way to work and it was not that bad.

In the end, the book is worth the irritation of the sound. The narrator does have a good voice for the book, it's just to bad the sound engineer did not do his job. Still I highly recommend the book.

I had wanted to read "Bringing Down the House" before the movie "21" came out, but Audible didn't offer it as an audio book until then. So I saw the movie first. I liked the movie so much, that I immediately downloaded the audio book as soon as I could.

Just like many books made into movies, there are numerous differences between the two, but they are both very enjoyable. However, I preferred the book over the movie just because of how much more detail is provided regarding the card counting techniques and team play. Even though the book lacked the cheesy romance (as played out in the movie), it more than made up for it by being more realistic and believable.

A lot of other reviewers noted the narration was sub-par. While the narrator wasn't the best I've heard, he certainly wasn't the worst. (Although he did sound a little like Casey Kasem.) If you're listening to this in your car, you most likely won't notice the recording flaws. However, they will become apparent when listening to it with headphones.

If you're interested in seeing the movie and reading the book, go see the movie first. I think if I had read the book first, I would have been more disappointed in the movie.

I too have listened to quite a few books over the past few years and I can't think of any book more exciting than this. Despite the corporate image Las Vegas has nowadays, I suspect this description of how the city really functions is probably accurate. When the group is getting caught (you know they had to--otherwise where is the story?) I found myself becoming extremely nervous. This type of reaction doesn't happen too often in listening to non-fiction. Definitely a worthwhile listen, maybe for a long boring car ride.

This book held me captivated. There has been the big craze since this movie came out or maybe earlier, so I jumped on board. I listened to this book and then did internet research, granted many people don't consider that type research reliable, I did it because it was easier. From what I understand the author took some liberties which is understandable, I really enjoyed it. I am not going to go and start counting cards, but it made me talk to folks who are black jack fans alot more and see their take. Enjoy.

As you will quickly discover, the movie may have been inspired by this book, and borrowed its premise and a few of its characters, but beyond that the two have little in common. The book goes into much more detail about the scheme, contains a raft of more interesting characters, is much more ambiguous about the morality of everyone involved, and does a much better job of explaining how it all ends up going downhill. It's likely more "reconstructed" than actual reportage: the scenic detail and quoted conversations are clearly manufactured from bits and pieces of reality, reconstructed into neater, more vivid people, images and events. But the conceit that this is all true does short-circuit any idea that the book will have clear heroes and villains, or that it will reach of Hollywood conclusion. I liked that about the book, frankly. It's well performed and thoroughly engaging. Credible? Well, part of the fun is guessing what's fact and what's embellishment. Kind of like gambling itself.

Before I decided on the book, I was so scared of the narration from all the bad reviews, that I almost didn't get it. But after seeing the movie "21," and being an avid gambling fiend myself, I decided to take my chances. It was an intriguing story with hints of the movie, and I didn't hear any of the complaints about the narrator. In fact, I just heard an engaging story, which is what a halfway decent narrator is supposed to do. If you liked the movie, you'll love this book.